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Rerun van Pelt
Rerun van Pelt is a major male character in the Peanuts comic strip by Charles M. Schulz. He is the younger brother of Linus and Lucy. Rerun is the youngest permanent character in Peanuts. History Rerun was born on May 23, 1972, in the middle of a storyline that involved Lucy kicking Linus out of the house. When Lucy compared having a second brother to television reruns, Linus thought "Rerun" would be a perfect name for the baby (or possibly nickname; his name is shown in quotation marks in some strips, but the first panel of the September 11, 1996 strip suggests that he does not know any other name for himself). Rerun's first actual appearance was on March 26, 1973. He joined Charlie Brown's baseball team on March 29, 1973. A few weeks later, the team won their first ever game, only to forfeit the game in a gambling scandal. It was revealed on April 19, 1973 that Rerun had bet on the game with Snoopy. At first, Rerun was only a minor character, appearing mostly on the back of his mother's bicycle, terrified. By the early 1980s, Schulz said he had "run out of ideas" on how to use Rerun. In a documentary, Sibling Rivalry: Growing Up Van Pelt, Schulz's widow recalled that he even admitted that, at that time, he regretted creating Rerun because he could not think of any further way to use the character, and yet he could not eliminate him altogether, as his siblings were main characters. indulge in a French Foreign Legion fantasy in Rerun van Pelt's sandbox.]] Rerun's appearances became rare. On occasion, he was simply shown sitting in the background, silently observing other characters. In one strip, he sat silently as Lucy declared that nothing that happened that day was her fault, then lifted his baby bottle to declare, "I'll drink to that.". In another strip, he sat silently in his sandbox as Snoopy and his Beagle Scouts marched past. In one ongoing storyline from March, 1992, there is no mention of Rerun at all when Snoopy stays with Linus and Lucy while Charlie Brown's family goes away on a trip. Infant Rerun appeared in several strips in November of 1992, again riding on the back of his mother's bike, and unsuccessfully being taught by Lucy to count fingers. Starting in 1993, he started appearing more frequently, having grown beyond infancy, and as Schulz said, Rerun "took over" the comic by the mid-1990s. Initially, toddler Rerun was shown playing cards with an equally confused Snoopy, and learning to tie his shoes from Lucy. By 1996, Rerun had aged to 5 years old and reluctantly entered kindergarten, so he was still younger than the other characters in the Peanuts gang. Schulz's widow speculated that Rerun's new-found prominence was likely due to the emergence of grandchildren in Schulz's life. A running gag featuring Rerun has him being too scared to go to kindergarten on some days, so he hid es under his bed. Lucy tries to get him to move, but Rerun rarely does. Another running gag is that Rerun wants a pet dog. He frequently borrows Snoopy from Charlie Brown. In one storyline, starting May 16, 1996, Rerun convinces Snoopy to invite Spike to move in to the van Pelt house as a pet. Rerun changes his mind when he sees how skinny Spike is. In strips from the final years of Peanuts, Rerun is often shown drawing "underground comics" at school against his teacher's instructions to draw pictures of flowers. Other characters often inform Rerun that his drawings do not resemble his intended subjects. At other times, Rerun tries to sell his drawings, including ones of Snoopy, door to door. In Sibling Rivalry: Growing Up Van Pelt, it is suggested that Schulz's story lines about Rerun's cartoonist aspirations were autobiographical. Schulz sometimes used Rerun as a successor to Linus in revisiting old storylines. In a 1973 strip, Lucy ruined Linus' first viewing of the movie Citizen Kane by revealing that "Rosebud" was the title character's sled, greatly upsetting Linus. A 1995 strip showed Lucy similarly beginning to ruin Rerun's first viewing of Citizen Kane, only to be stopped by an angry Linus. In another strip from 1999, Lucy is shown chastising Rerun for patting birds on the head, just as she had similarly chastised Linus in several strips over the previous decades. Perhaps the most common joke used about Rerun refers to his poor basketball skills. Linus first introduces Rerun to basketball in the strip from July 28, 1994. In subsequent strips, Rerun is often seen on the basketball court, but he is not very good. He is often shown kicking the ball in frustration, only to have it bounce back at him. In one strip he keeps missing the basket, puts the basketball in a closet and closes the door, saying, "You can come out when you learn to behave." Rerun also yearns to play baseball on Charlie Brown's team. Despite having been allowed to join the team as an infant, leading to the gambling scandal that cost the team a rare win, strips from the 1990s often show Rerun's request being rejected by Charlie Brown. After Charlie Brown bluntly refuses to let Rerun play because he is too young and too small, Rerun accuses him of discrimination and obtains a court order, signed by Snoopy the World Famous Attorney, allowing him to play. Rerun bears a strong physical resemblance to Linus. In appearances from the 1970s and 1980s, Rerun is virtually identical, to Linus, though he is smaller. In many appearances, he is even shown wearing the same striped shirt and black shorts as Linus, and has the same hairstyle. Rerun's appearance evolved in the 1990s, as he aged beyond infancy. Rerun was mostly shown wearing overalls, and his hair was shown as shorter and flatter. While he continued to share Linus' facial features, Rerun's head also grew rounder, and larger in proportion to his body. In the 1986 special Happy New Year, Charlie Brown!, when he is helping his siblings blow up balloons for the New Year's party, he actually blows them until they look like ice cubes. Linus convinces him to blow slower, but to no avail; and even an attempt to blow an elongated balloon fails. Relationships Linus Rerun seems to get along with Linus for the most part, but they each have significantly less interaction with each other than with their sister, Lucy. Like Lucy, Rerun can sometimes be embarrassed by Linus' habits, like his security blanket, and how he waits for the Great Pumpkin every October. Rerun has admitted to Snoopy that he is unable to look up to Linus as a role model because of his thumb-sucking and blanket. When Rerun became a main character in the 1990s, most of his sibling contact was with Lucy, only interacting with Linus to express embarrassment at his thumb-sucking, security blanket and Great Pumpkin beliefs. It was Linus that introduced Rerun to Basketball in 1994. Lucy Lucy definitely shows a softer side to Rerun than she does to Linus. She is generally nice to Rerun, but still somewhat crabby, and often acts as a mentor to him. In his first appearance in the strip, on March 26, 1973, Lucy is seen taking the infant Rerun outside for the first time. A few days later, she convinces a reluctant Charlie Brown to let Rerun play on their baseball team. In strips from the early 1990s, when Rerun was reintroduced as a toddler, Lucy is shown teaching him how to tie his shoes. In the later years of Peanuts' run, Lucy is seen playing board games with Rerun, trying to lure Rerun out from under the bed for school, and even listening to Rerun's accounts of his day in kindergarten. Unable to play on Charlie Brown's baseball team one day, she sends Rerun in her place, having trained him to yell "Throw the ball over the plate, you blockhead!" at Charlie Brown. Lucy shows particular concern when Rerun appears to be at risk of adopting Linus' habits, telling him, "Your brother is a blockhead." This is demonstrated when Rerun is seen patting birds on the head in the same manner that Linus had done in previous years, and again when Linus tried to convert Rerun into a Great Pumpkin believer. Rerun often shows a knack for getting around Lucy and weakening her defenses, whereas Linus is apt to give up and just let Lucy dominate him. In one strip, Lucy walks up to Rerun building a sand castle in a sandbox, and asks him what he would do if she kicked it down. Rerun responds; "Oh, nothing I guess. But years from now, when you and your husband come over to my house, and ask me to co-sign for a loan for you, I might remember it". Lucy appears to think this over for a moment, and then walks away grinding her teeth in frustration, while Rerun smugly continues building his sand castle. Little Pigtailed Girl Rerun seems to have an innocent crush on the Little Pigtailed Girl, who sits next to him in their kindergarten class. He always talks to her in a flirty way, and she is often seen pointing out problems with his classroom drawings. In one strip he takes her to one of Charlie Brown's baseball games. One series of strips sees Rerun jokingly offer to run away to Paris with her, which results in a one day long term suspension from school for harassment. Snoopy Snoopy and Rerun were first shown in the same strip on March 27, 1973 when Snoopy greets the infant Rerun in his sandbox by licking his face. Snoopy then turns away, observing that Rerun "tastes terrible." In strips from the later years of Peanuts, Rerun repeatedly asks Charlie Brown if he can borrow Snoopy, as his mother will not let him have a dog of his own. Snoopy and Rerun are often seen together in later strips, playing card games, throwing and chasing balls and frolicking in the snow. Rerun, younger than the other children in the strip, even treats Snoopy as a confidant at times, sharing his anxieties and thoughts with the beagle, who often responds with exasperated or sarcastic thoughts. Charlie Brown Charlie Brown and Rerun have little interaction with each other in strips from the 1970s and 1980s. The main exception being the storyline from 1973 in which Lucy convinces a reluctant Charlie Brown to let infant Rerun join his baseball team. After Rerun is instrumental in the team's win, Charlie Brown is later infuriated when the win is stripped from the team because Rerun had bet on the game. ]]There is significantly more contact between the two in strips from the 1990s, after grew beyond infancy. Rerun is often shown asking to be allowed to play on the baseball team and to borrow Snoopy. Charlie Brown is usually unwilling to let Rerun play on his team, but is usually willing to let him play with Snoopy. Unlike the other children, Rerun comes to admire Charlie Brown. While watching Charlie Brown warm up on his pitcher's mound on one occasion, Rerun refers to him as "the Master." Charlie Brown becomes somewhat of a mentor to Rerun, teaching him how to feed a dog, how to deliver newspapers, and how to play marbles. When the bully Joe Agate tricks Rerun into losing all of his marbles, Charlie Brown wins them back for Rerun. Trivia *Rerun is one of the many ''Peanut ''characters to appear in the game ''Snoopy's Street Fair, ''in which, he owns a face painting booth. External links * [http://gocomics.com/peanuts/1972/05/23 Lucy learns that she has a new baby brother in the ''Peanuts comic strip from May 23, 1972.] * [http://gocomics.com/peanuts/1973/03/26 The first appearance of Rerun in Peanuts ''comic strip from March 26, 1973.] * [http://www.gocomics.com/peanuts/2000/01/30 Rerun's last appearance in the ''Peanuts comic strip January 30, 2000] Category:Characters introduced in 1972 Category:Boys